Our mouths are for eating

Miss Miri shows us how she can use her mouth for something besides yelling... of which she does a lot.

Our family, in boots

Aunt Peg posted the cutest pic of Uncle Wes' boots on FaceBook. Inspired me. Here we have our family's much-worn boots. Gee, can you tell what season it is?

Newest Family Members

We have adopted two kittens.

With the loss over of the last year of Carly and Mrs. Jones, we had some openings on the team. But we wanted to wait until Miri was a little older. Mommy's goal was to get two (so they would play well with each other) and somewhat young (so they would adapt to our household and busy-ness more easily). Daddy's goal was to make sure they were easy to tell apart. So they came from two different litters, but they are very close in age.

Meet the kitties...


Pretty little Purrl PussyCat (Aleaha's cat).


Adorable little Julius Von BearCat (called "Jules" by Miri). He's Miri's main kitty.


Miri offers Purrl a bite of apple. A nice gesture, but not exactly what she was after.


Miri reads books to Julius BearCat. Hmm, perhaps "Good Dog Carl" wasn't the best choice??


Purrl is very patient and calm.


Aaaaahhh, pat the kitty....


Love the kitty!

Aleaha and her kitty share an affection for the same spot on the couch. Fortunately, her kitty is very patient and loves to be held/smothered.

What exactly does Miri think of the kitties? She says, "Hooray!"

These kitties are, as Daddy says, "farts in a skillet". They move dangerously fast around the house. Can't get clear pictures unless they are sleeping, they move so fast. Definitely tripping hazards! If Miri sees one, she immediately wants to know where the other "une" is. ("Une" or "oon" is her word for one, or sometimes for "you"....as in "I love une.")

But when she sees Jules, she says "Mine!", loud and clear.

Nice Day for a Walk

On our last day off before it was time to go back to work & school, we took a walk in the very chilly-but-sunny weather. Here is a shot of Aleaha with Marys Peak in the background.

To EO for Christmas

We were able to take a few days to see family in EO, celebrate Christmas, and get some time to play in the snow.


Aleaha readies her saucer to take on the hill, while Uncle Mike watches below.


Down she goes! (Uncle Mike now appears at the bottom of the hill, supervising the landings. We had a couple of cases of nearly-lost sleds and sledders, as the darn things tended to take off in the wrong direction. On her first time down, Aleaha swerved off the hill, went over a lip of snow, caught a lot of air, and did a bit of a loop-de-loop. Mom was afraid she was hurt, because she was almost in tears. But all was proven fine when Aleaha said, "Um, Mom, was that cool?")


Miri loved her new baby sled from Gramma Bon. She preferred to sit in it and watch the happenings, close to wherever Mommy was.


We tried to see if Miri would like to go down the hill with Uncle Mike, but NOTHIN' DOIN' was her response.


"Hey Mom, my finger is cold. Can I put it in your nose?"


Miri didn't have snow boots or pants, but she did like to stand for a few minutes....


...until Mommy left her next to the snowman. Not nice, Mama!!


Quick photo op with G'ma Bon.


Happy Snow Bunnies.



These were a couple of very tired kiddos on the way back home!

Christmas Carols, Aleaha Style

She's fascinated by all the songs of the season. Children's songs, "songs about the baby Jesus," and silly songs, like the dogs who bark out Jingle Bells. Par for her age, she likes to hear the same song over and over again, and she must practice singing it Just So. If interrupted, she starts all over again, at the beginning. (A bit of a bore, honestly, when it's the twelfth round of The Twelve Days of Christmas. ) But I indulge her, figuring that she wants to get it right.

Then tonight, I hear this:

"Deeeeeeeck the halls with Christmas Stuuuuuuuuuuffff, fa la la la la, la la la la."

Christmas Prep

Mommy has a few outfits for the girls to wear. It's nearly impossible to get good photos of them, but we try anyway. (And the red-eye fix in Picasa would not work on these, for some reason. So our kids look possessed.)


These are their green vests, which match the ones for their cousins for Christmas. Can't wait to see all the kids together!

Daddy put up house lights this year, for the first time since the 2006 tree-falling-on-our-house incident. Let's hope that doesn't happen again this year! (Notice how particular he is about the exact placement of each bulb....the house looks AMAZING because of this attention to detail.)

Aleaha got in a funk, and Mommy just had to take a picture. Didn't help her mood, you can be sure! But she knows that Santa is watching, so no pouting!

Aleaha has made a few gingerbread houses. These two (which are acutally made of brown sugar) are gifts for Arby and Jake. It's a good thing we snapped the photo when we did, because the next day, the little houses had completely fallen apart. The gel-goo holding them together didn't meet code, apparently. But we're sure the horses will love them just the same.